Diabetic care training bill becomes law

While there are many critics of the most recent Louisiana’s legislative session, all can agree that a win-win was the passage of Senate Bill 759.

Signed by Gov. Jindal last month, the new law is designed to help in the fight to keep children with diabetes safe at school.

According to the American Diabetes Association, the new law allows school employees to volunteer to be trained to help children with diabetes with essential care tasks. These tasks include administering insulin, which is needed multiple times a day, and glucagon, a hormone needed in the case of dangerously low blood glucose levels. This bill also allows children, if they are capable to do so, to self-manage their diabetes while at school.

“The passage of Senate Bill 759 is a major step forward for all children in Louisiana living with diabetes,” said Eloise Keene, the Louisiana state advocacy chair for the American Diabetes Assoc­iation.

Keene’s daughter has type 1 diabetes, and her efforts were instrumental in the bill’s introduction and passage. “Now, children like my daughter will finally have access to the vital diabetes care they need to stay safe and healthy while at school.”

“This legislation is an important advancement in ensuring the healthcare needs of all of our students are met,” said, Senator Ben Nevers, author of the piece of legislation that has become law. “Moving forward, no child in Louisiana will lack the support needed to manage their diabetes and their health, allowing all of our students to be medically safe at school.”

An estimated 215,000 children under the age of 20 are living with diabetes in the United States. Diabetes is a disease that must be managed 24/7, including the many hours spent at school, on field trips and in extra-curricular activities if these vulnerable children are to avoid blood glucose levels that can be life-threatening in the short term and lead to blindness, amputation, kidney failure and heart disease later in life. Every day, these children are put in dangerous situations if no one is present at school to help with insulin and glucagon administration.

This article was originally published in the July 2, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper